I was sad that I had to restrain him in that strange, small attic room above the factory. But what choice did I have? If he had escaped then Mama would certainly have put an end to him. I tried my best to make him secure. But then I imagine that is what the zookeeper feels when watching a beautiful jungle creature pacing and padding up and down its miserable enclosure.

At any rate, one day I made my way up the spiral stair only to find the door ajar, the chains undone and my precious Monster fled.

I was still there, weeping over the abandoned chains when I felt a chill presence enter the room. Mama.

‘What is the meaning of this?’ she hissed, taking in the scene and, I imagine, positing theories.

‘Oh Mama,’ I sobbed. ‘I have been foolish.’

‘Foolish?’

‘I have formed a … a sentimental attachment.’

My words were like scalding water thrown in her face. ‘An attachment? To whom?’

I sank into a position of supplication. ‘A young man. Unlike the others, he survived rejection. He must be strong. Worthy of salvation—’

I heard the clank of my monster’s manacles as Mama held them up. ‘Wrecker! Beserker!’ she spat. ‘You have loosed a Reject onto the outside world?’

‘I have disappointed you—’

‘My plans must be accelerated!’ cried Mama with a curious exultation in her voice. ‘Nothing must interfere with the Great Work!’

I put my hands together as though in prayer. ‘But please say there is still room for me in your new Eden, Mama! Promise me that!’

But Mama seemed not to hear me. ‘I will set my Pilgrims onto him.’

I reached out and grabbed at her skirts, desperate for some words of comfort. But Mama had no mind for such things.

‘Kindly do not paw and slobber at my crinolines. You know I can’t bear to look at sick people.’

A ragged cry escaped me. ‘Oh, Mama! Promise you will not abandon me! Promise me, Mama!’

But she reached down and disconnected my knotted hands from her silks. ‘Do you not yet understand that there can be no place for such as you? That only perfection is good enough for myself and for Mr Sweet?’

I heard her skirts swish over the cold stone floor as she made swiftly for the door. But she stopped briefly and turned back. ‘The bright day is done, child. And you are for the dark.’

*

Being the reminiscences of Miss Jenny Flint, lady’s maid of Paternoster Row, London.

‘Poor Edmund Thursday must have come looking for us,’ said the Doctor, ‘and then fallen into a vat of the pure venom. Or was pushed. Didn’t stand a chance.’